Utopia~
by Vienna
Summary: A Shuis/Cast fic~Read the Author's note in Chapter One, It explains everything~ Rated R because I'm really not sure, and it COULD go higher.


Authors Note: This is my first Passions fanfic, I started it quite a while ago, and never finished the first chapter, but I've been working on it again for a day or so, mostly because I just finished a whole bunch of work, and found myself suddenly with nothing to do, and I finally got around to posting it. For the record: this fanfic will contain Shuis, Juvy and Kase, because they are my three favorite couples, it will also feature the missing Crane children, and a little Gwank, Beth/Antonio and Therethan, for those of you who like that stuff. It will be Shuis for the first few chapters, and the other characters will flood in a little later, but they will appear~ This is a Passions fanfic, so all characters will be taking up roles. I have most of the story already outlined, but I am opened to suggestions.  
  
This fanfic takes place two years in the future, after it has come out that Ethan is Sam's son. Ethan and Theresa hit a rough spot for a while, but remained together, deciding not to be married until Ethan could establish himself as a lawyer and settle into his new life as a non-Crane. He currently lives in a moderate apartment in Harmony and runs a successful practice, Theresa still lives in the Lopez-Fitzgerald home, and she and Ethan plan to move into a house together after their wedding. They are engaged, but have not set a date.  
  
Sheridan and Luis were also engaged following the revelation of Ethan's true paternity, and decided to be married as soon as possible. However, a little over a month before their planned wedding Luis was involved in an accident while on duty, he died after two comatose weeks. No evidence of foul play or involvement by the Cranes was detected. Sheridan never recovered; she lives by herself and tries to avoid contact with her family, Ethan being the only exception. She and Theresa co-run a boutique in town; Sheridan handles the business and finances, and Theresa designs and selects the stock. They are very successful.  
  
Julian did not divorce Ivy, because Cranes do not divorce. Angry and depressed over losing Ethan, he broke off his affair with Rebecca, and asked that she and Gwen kindly leave the mansion~She did, but not without first pitching a fit. Gwen, seeing how pathetic her mother really was, lost faith in her scheming and decided to move on. She and Hank have been dating for six months. Julian and Ivy still live in a loveless marriage, but are no longer openly malicious toward one another, Ivy because she is relieved to have maintained her title, and Julian because Ivy stopped being such a b*tch.  
  
Alistair re-instated Julian as his heir, and Julian, still reeling from the enormity of losing his son, devoted himself full-time to Crane Industries, now more successful than ever. Alistair is pleased that his son had become such a lucrative asset, and happy that his daughter is too broken to cause any problems.  
  
Pilar, devastated from the loss of another child, fell into a severe depression. Miguel, desperate to help his mother, finally contacted Antonio, who agreed to return. Pilar, overjoyed at his return, was convinced that life was not over, that obstacles no matter how awful must be overcome. Her faith restored, Pilar allowed Theresa to convince her to take some time to start living her life. Pilar resigned her position as head Crane housekeeper. And though she was disappointed, Ivy insisted Pilar accept a bonus for suffering so long as her confidante. That "bonus" is now funding Pilar's very comfortable life in Spain, with the occasional weekend trip to Italy. Though always tight with money, even Julian agreed (begrudgingly) that Pilar's happiness was well deserved.  
  
Miguel proposed to Charity on her 18th birthday, they have decided to wait until after college to be married. Kay, after watching the "love of her life" become engaged to another women, finally realized how much she had lost herself over the years. She went cold-turkey on Miguel, throwing herself back into her studies senior year (tutored by her half brother, Ethan, she managed a very good transcript), and after a few months warmed up to the idea of dating Reese for real. Reese was shocked but overjoyed by her new, more affectionate behavior towards him. They attend Colby college together, only a short distance from Harmony. They are in love.  
  
The title for this chapter is taken from the song:  
  
  
  
"Once Upon A December"  
  
Performed by Deana Carter  
  
Dancing bears  
  
Painted wings  
  
Things I almost remember  
  
And a song someone sings  
  
Once upon a December  
  
You hold me safe and warm  
  
Horses prance through a silver storm  
  
Figures dancing gracefully  
  
Across my memory  
  
Far away, long ago  
  
Glowing dim as an ember  
  
Things my heart  
  
Used to know  
  
Once upon a December  
  
Someone holds me safe and warm  
  
Horses prance through a silver storm  
  
Figures dancing gracefully  
  
Across my memory  
  
Far away, long ago  
  
Glowing dim an as ember  
  
Things my heart  
  
Used to know  
  
Things it yearns to remember  
  
And a song  
  
Someone sings  
  
Once upon a December  
  
  
  
If you haven't heard it, you should download the MP3, it's lovely.  
  
Now after the longest authors note in the history of fanfic…  
  
  
  
  
  
Utopia~ (Chapter One)~ Glowing Dim as an Ember  
  
  
  
The snow fell in clusters, dancing down from the sky to quietly settle on the ground. Already a blanket of white covered the gentle landscape. At 5:00 on a Sunday morning the snow had not yet been touched, and covered the earth so flawlessly that, to an observer, it would appear to be the natural color of the rolling hills, like a great albino sea. Only habitual logic would betray this illusion, preferring the knowledge that the great white mass would melt under the warmth of a human hand, that in a few hours the hills would be dotted with the footprints of little children playing with their dogs, or lovers strolling hand-in-hand, that the slopes would be streaked with sled tracks, and the long ends of the grass would poke through the flattened snow. But to see the town now, all these things would be forgotten, the perfection of the moment, however ephemeral, would overwhelm, and reality would suddenly seem like a quaint, somewhat mundane, little notion.  
  
The sun was bright, but cold. There was no warmth in the light reflecting so brilliantly off the ice covered town. Calm waves rolled silently into the harbor, empty lobster boats rocked gently on the dark surface of the salty sea. Occasionally their bells would chime, ever so softly, as if to thank the water for it's gentle touch. Aside from that not a sound could be heard, save for the soft hum of the breeze and the almost indecipherable creaking of wood as it danced through the streets.  
  
It was one of those moments, those peaceful serene moments that make a person want to never move again, to stay forever in that time and place, basking in the perfection of the very air. And, for once, the title "Harmony", for that was what the town was called, seemed completely and undeniably appropriate. The day was beautiful.  
  
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She walked down the street leisurely, only vaguely wondering at its apparent desertion. Gazing down the street to the opening of the harbor she idly asked herself how something so simple as water could be so beautiful. And then suddenly, so suddenly that if she had not been looking at that very particular spot of water she would have missed it, something slid above the surface. A fin, perhaps? But no, it was curved in a continuous manner, like a coil, breaking above the gentle waves and glinting in the sun only for a second, before disappearing again, slinking almost, back into the deep. This was how it always began.  
  
She blinked, it was gone. She stood perfectly still, the way people often do when attempting to recapture a moment that they have not understood and are certain they will never be able to fully relate. She felt an uncanny urge to reach her arm out towards the water. And then, with all the uncertainty in the world, she took half a step back. She felt the tension leave her neck, and she released the breath she had been holding. She glanced again at the harbor, more confident this time, and decided firmly that what she had seen was nothing more that the overzealous roll of a rebellious wave, refusing the calm the ocean had demanded of it. But as she began to walk again, maybe a little more briskly now, without the saunter of a person in love with their surroundings, she felt a hollow feeling begin to knot up in her stomach, and the wind was much colder at the back of her neck.  
  
She watched the small indentations made by her stilettos is the light layer of snow covering the pavement, chancing to look up again only as she neared the commercial end of the town. Again, she slowed her walk noticing for the first time how dark the windows seemed. Surely, they had not been so dark earlier in the day. She shut her eyes tightly and inhaled, feeling for all the world like a little girl, willing the bright day to return. But when she opened her eyes it had not returned. A cloud moved in front of the sun, and a foreboding shadow fell on the town. The dark patches everywhere (waiting maliciously under the awnings, on the dark side of buildings, under the corners of windowsills) jumped with delight. They seemed to scamper like gleeful little vermin, capturing corners, alleys, whole walls as their own.  
  
She was decidedly uncomfortable. The beginnings of fear manifesting itself in her mind. She turned again, quickening her pace and forcing herself not to turn around, she had only one more block before she reached the Church. And, like clockwork, she began to feel that confusing sense of deja vu, nagging at her, commanding her to stop walking and think, think, why did this seem so familiar. The foreign town, the stores she could not identify, why were they all a path she had traveled a million times before?  
  
She was looking for someone; she realized (the always punctual realization) she was looking for him. It hit her like a ton of bricks, she suddenly felt her loss, and was seized by uncontrollable desperation. The kind of desperation that makes your eyes twitch and your breath speed up, and the walls are growing or shrinking and you know you would run if you could just decide which direction to run in, and then you're frantic. She had to find him, that's why she was here. Instinctively, she knew she was searching, had been searching for as long as she could remember. Instinctively, she knew her need for him, and for the first time that lifelong day she realized her solitude. She felt the aloneness as it raced at her from every house, every store, every garden, every well of abandonment, and threatened to suffocate her as it carved out her stomach and knotted in her throat. Instinctively too, she knew that she would never see him again. He had been taken from her and he would never be returned. But still, if only to escape the terrible aloneness, she searched and would continue to search until her blood ran cold and the breath left her body.  
  
She ran, as the darkness fogged the windows and clouded the sky. The snow had turned charcoal and the harbor was churning. She rounded the corner to where she instinctively knew the church would be, and relief flooded through her, until...this was not the church she remembered.  
  
She froze, looking at the massive building before her, it's peeling walls reached up slantingly toward the sky, black ice clung to the overhangs, the ebony doors stretched for miles before her small frightened hands. Her feet would move nowhere but forward, it was an awful moment. A moment everyone experiences at some point, like when picking up a phone while aware of the horrible news waiting on the other end of the line. She knew better than to open those doors, she knew she did not want to see what was inside that awful building, and yet, whether by morbid fascination of the sheer power of inevitability, she could not will her legs to turn and leave. She knew also that if she closed her eyes and concentrated, very hard, she could regain control of her body, she could force herself away, but this knowledge always came a fraction of a second too late. The doors swung open of their own accord. She braced herself, like a little girl preparing to look under the bed, as she does every evening, knowing that she has never found anything there before, but what if tonight...  
  
But there was nothing. A harmless sanctuary stood before her and she nearly cried out in happiness. She ran inside the safety of it warmed her; the cold flowing in from the still opened doors went unfelt. Until she saw it, the cross, it hung, as always above the dais, but it was hung upside down. She heard the doors slam shut and realized her error, the mistake she was doomed to make every night for the rest of her life. She ran from the unholy place, hitting the doors with all her might until they burst outward. Stumbling over the steps and slipping on the icy walkway, she dared not turn around. She could hear the sounds of the ivy, once so beautiful on the church's outer walls, changing, the thorns breaking from it's benign branches, stretching upward covering the steeple and shooting along the ground, catching her ankles and slicing her skin, thriving on her blood. She was out of the churchyard when she began to cry.  
  
The buildings tilted, their contorted forms bleeding, the redness dripping from their walls, flooding the streets, the ground, the sky was black. The harbor swirled with thousands of coils, twisting through the water, the monster knotting in the cold, cold depths. The tears ran in rivers down her face, she new she had no escape, as the coils shot forth, crushing the boats along the peers, and the thorns raced from the church and the blood flowed from the town. And the screaming, the unbearable screaming of a million tortured souls, in agony and in ecstasy blurring together in one horrid voice, and she knew he was among them. The thorns and the monster and the blood and the screaming, the voices, burning in the flames, and he was there, she was screaming now, sobbing and screaming and burning all at once...  
  
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Sheridan Crane bolted up; the sweat was trickling down her forehead, stinging her eyes. Her breathing was ragged, her heart was pumping like there was no tomorrow, and she could still feel the sobs racking her chest.  
  
All the immense fear of the previous moment was replaced only by sadness, a sorrow so immense that for a moment she truly could not breath. She was drenched in sweat, her soaked pajamas clung to her back, her bed was hot and her skin sticky, her face, her face was sticky too. Tear stained, she knew.  
  
She hated where she was, hated her empty bed *Luis, I had the nightmare again, Luis* hated the world for taking him from her. Hated life so much that she simply let herself fall back down into her hot uncomfortable bed, and swore that she would never again rise from that spot, never again face the world alone.  
  
But the shadows changed her mind. They gathered in the corners of her room, in the dark little corners, so reminiscent of other shadows, where had she seen them? She was frightened, and like always, since the love had drained from her soul, she was driven by her fear. Her resolve disappeared, she raced from her bed over to the window, trying desperately not to notice the shadows, evil little shadows, flying at her from their evil little corners, and flung open the curtains. Daylight flooded into the room, soft cold rays of early morning sunlight drifted in, settling on her face.  
  
She glanced back at her bedroom, in her comfortable apartment, in the nice residential quarter of Harmony, where she had lived for the past two years, alone. The shadows were gone, taking the nightmare with them. Sheridan sighed, a loud mournful sigh, for no one's benefit save her own, and studied the lovely town her family had called home for over a century.  
  
The church bells tolled.  
  
She stood gazing out the window and tried desperately to ignore the migraine already beginning to throb in the back of her skull. It was going to be a beautiful day.  
  
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Hope you enjoyed~ My e-mail is Jennvienna@yahoo.com, feedback is adored!  
  
~Jenn 


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